I don't see any dwarves or gnomes in this. It is meant as a spin off from a steampunk submission in a setting where the mentioned high society circles (in human society) exist. No dwarves or gnomes required really. Go to Comment

- The knocking on it to summon bees part should have a chance to turn the bees on the character knocking instead.
- However, when a blow to the head is received while wearing the helmet, the swarm is summoned immediately and focuses exclusively on the one that delivered the hit for the rest of the fight.

Also, there should be some penalty for wearing 7 kilos of iron on your head and shoulders. On the other hand the honey harvested can have special (for example minor healing) properties if certain herbs can be found in the region through which the character is travelling, but it should not be available in winter or extremely barren places.

The piece can require some special attention too, if the bees decide to swarm (split in two because a new queen has been born).

On a side note, are you applying for the dwarves guild too? :) Go to Comment

1) He lied to the shaman in order to get what he wanted, because he knew that the shaman would not agree otherwise.

2) He did not die for years, instead losing any strength he had, including body weight. In the eyes of the people from the village he had to be dead long ago.

3) The tree creates a minor concentration of decay around it in order to funnel life force into itself. When the spiritual link increased its power over the fauna around it the amount of decay increased so much that it rivaled the Spark of Decay and it practically moved there in order to keep the overall balance in the world. The existence of the Spark of Life without the decay created the Everlife dungeon.

The two sparks normally inhabit the same being, in order to balance themselves and provide the fast development that was the initial idea. In a plant it effects also other plants around it to create an environment for the development. In animals (or sentient beings ;) ) the effect is concentrated in one being only, and it's development may be physical, mental or other. In this case the changes will be more evident in the being's progeny.

The Sparks were inhabiting a plant in some other part of the world when the explorer got linked to the Tree. The Tree itself is just a living species of tree that has a magical ability. Its appearance is not discussed, but may easily have been the result of a previous cycle of development helped by the Sparks.

And on the question of what happens, that is an answer that has yet to come out of someone's imagination! Go to Comment

Additional ideas:
- A wizard/scientist that tries to synchronize seeds with the plant at the center of the dungeon to make the source jump into one of them (looking for eternal life).
- An evil cult that has on its agenda to pursue and destroy the spark of life (they think they have the means). Go to Comment

Hi, those are great comments and I haven't really thought about the undead. The perimeter of the spark of life is a "no decay" zone, so I suppose any undead will be perfectly preserved and still be undead when they enter. However, as their physical bodies (if any) are no longer living, they will not be subject to the protective power of the energy source and once destroyed their spirits will bind to the spark and will not be available to be bound to flesh again. On that note, the creation of undead inside the dungeon should be impossible, as all free spirits are drawn and bound to the spark and dragging them away is a feat on a godly scale. The same should happen to incorporeal beings that do not have another place to go to (another plane, etc.), so the dungeon (or the vicinity of the source, if no dungeon has grown up yet) is a place safe from the lesser incorporeal beings. Again something that I haven't thought about is what should happen to spirits that have not had a physical form at all (outsider beings and natural spirits). Maybe they can be drawn in the spark itself, becoming part of its energy. Go to Comment

A travelling group of anophelites passes through a swamp with a Friar's Weed population in bloom. The whole group is drawn to the flowers and drinks their sap, getting hit by the neurotoxin so hard that they go crazy permanently. The group then runs like mad to the nearest village and drains the stunned population for as much blood as they can get before the people start fighting back. Then they retreat in the swamp and start creating a homunculus army to fight off an imaginary enemy. The players happen to be near the place and have to stop the crazed anophelites before its too late. Go to Comment

It will be interesting to know whether there are ways to travel between the Shards, and also if there is some magic that keeps them close together after the breaking of the world. But I guess these are questions that may be far from the everyday life of the sixteen species. Do they know that the others exist? And Is there something to happen soon as 16 thousand years have passed (16 species, 8 moons, 16 thousand years, there is a pattern here :) ).

Also, maybe the Shards and the moons circle each other in a kind of very complex astronomy exercise and the distances between them have some effects connected with all the power, magic and influence of the Interlopers?

I'll be happy to help with the writing when you are ready with the species description. Go to Comment